and i don't know if under recommendation 5 that the recommendations that are made will fall within what we were talking about earlier. is that too much? >> there is a specific suggestion that is not legal under the state of california, the name of the respondents. our recommended follow up from the report, you will see this in several weeks with an updated in your report, we are planning to have summaries of each substantiated complaint that we have investigated and closed included with what has previously been the accountability report. >> it has to be somewhat general from our perspective so that they can determine the initial

complaint and was. >> yes to the finding, but no to the specific recommendation? supervisor campos: finding seven. the current whistle-blower protections are inadequate. and independent administrative law judge dealing with retaliation issues. that responsibility should be removed from the ethics commission. i agree with the finding, and i do believe that we need to change the system as it currently is. i don't know if the administrative law judge necessarily is the best solution. my experience is that there are benefits and limitations in terms of what they are able to

do and the authority that they have. to the extent that you want the strongest possible tool for investigation and implementation, i don't know if it is the way to go. i would say yes to the finding but not necessarily to the recommendation. supervisor farrell: i will be happy to support that. i would concur with finding number eight. pretty patently stated by the director, saying the to recommendation no. 7, specifically laying out the remedy here is too specific to get into right now for the board at this point in time. i say yes to a to and no to 7. >> i understand the intent, but

i would say that in many respects, not only do not want to specify the committee, but in some respects, it doesn't go far out of. when someone makes a whistle- blower complaint, from the moment in that complaint happens, we in the city should be monitoring whether not any kind of action is taken in terms of the employee. i think from the moment the complaint is filed, you have to be watching that. findin nine, the independent oversight of the whistleblower program, president chiu, any

thoughts? president chiu: i am happy to take the controller's recommendation on that. >> that would be no on finding nine. supervisor campos: recommendation eight. i actually like the recommendation. >> i apologize to interrupt your deliberation. the chair of the business thought a review board with a year earlier and had to leave to go back to work, but on this recommendation, they have forwarded to the civil grand jury and to use the concurrence with the ongoing this -- ongoing

the >> finding no. 11, this is, i think, it seems to me that i am happy to say yes to this, it just seems to be the nature of the beast and nothing to do with how they -- i think it's how they handle certain cases and taking them inside. i would say no to recommendation number 10. supervisor campos: president chiu, any thoughts on 13? whistle-blower investigation,

and establishing the appeals process? president chiu: they seem fairly straightforward. >> the understanding that we will look at whether it is the appropriate mechanism going forward, i don't want to decide that here today. i think there is a process needed to have some type of appeal here. and the findings of 14 and 13, i would be in favor of saying no to both of those. i think it gives a lot of perverse incentives here. i don't think is something that we want to incentivize in our government. supervisor campos: i don't know if the staff and budget

legislative analyst was able to follow that. >> i think i have a summary if you want me to go back through. finding one, disagree. recommendation one, disagree. finding six, agree. recommendation five, disagree spearhead. finding seveneight, agree. recommendation seven, disagree. finding nine, disagree. recommendation eight, agree.

finding e11, agree. recommend 10 xinhua,, disagree. finding 13, disagree. >> no. that's agree. >> that was the one i was not clear on. the finding 14 was disagree. supervisor farrell: recommendation 12 was disagree. supervisor campos: ok, so -- >> there is one more. recommendation 13 is disagree. supervisor campos: we have a motion from supervisor farrell. thank you, colleagues, for your thoughts on that. before we move on this, i want to acknowledge the work of the budget and legislative analyst.

their office has spent a great deal of time working with us going through the civil grand jury report. there are very meticulous and thorough, i want to thank them for their work on this. we have of motion. if we can take that without objection. again, something as important as the whistleblower program, if we don't agree with everything that was said, the kind of discussion that we just had shows the great deal of benefit that can come from this kind of report. i think a lot of good things can happen because of this. i want to thank the controller for his work and to the members of the civil grand jury and members of the public that have been waiting to speak on this matter. is there any other business before the committee?

meeting adjourned.

>> good evening, and welcome to the meeting of the board of appeals. chris wong will be absent this evening. to my left is the deputy city attorney. she will provide needed legal advice this evening. i am the executive director. we are joined our representatives of the planning department. we are joined by joseph dufty, the senior building inspector. at this time if you would conduct the swearing-in process. but the board requests you turn off cellphone and pagers.

please carry on conversations in the hallway. representatives have seven minutes to present their cases and three minutes for rebuttals. people affiliated with these parties must complete their presentation which in seven minutes. replies have three minutes. to assist the board, members of the public who wish to speak on an item are asked but not required to submit a speaker cards or a business card to the staff when you come tuesday. -- come to speak. the board welcomes suggestions. their survey forms on the left of the podium as well. if you have questions about the hearing, please speak to the board staff after the meeting or

call the office tomorrow morning. the board office is located at 1650 mission street. this meeting is to broadcast live on government television, and the visa of this meeting are available for purchased directly from sfgtv. thank you for your attention. if you intend to testify at any of the hearings and wish to have the board give your testimony wait, please stand, raise your right hand, and say i do. please note that any member of the public may speak pursuant to the code. thank you.

do you solemnly swear and affirm the testimony you are about to give will be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. >> starting with public comment. is there any member of the public who would like to speak on an item that is not on the agenda? seeing none, we will move to number two, which is commissioner questions and comments. >> i have a conflict on december 7, so i will be absent from that meeting. >> any other commissioner comments? any public comment on this item. we will move to item no. 3, the adoption of minister before you for discussion -- of minutes before you for discussion. >> i move for adoption. >> is there public comment on the minutes? seeing none, call the roll.

no blacks on that motion to adopt the minutes, and -- >> on that motion to adopt the minutes -- [caling votes] >> those minutes are adopted. >> we move to the jurisdiction request. we received a motion asking that the board take jurisdiction over a building permit. the appeal time ended on july 1, and it was received at the board on august 19. the permit holder is for altering a gabled roof and replacing windows with french doors and converting an attic.

the matter was continued to allow time for a permit to be issued, and no additional briefing was allowed. the original permit was issued and appealed common and and that is scheduled to be heard in december. this is separate from that, because it is a jurisdiction request, and if granted, both appeals would be heard at the same time. we can give each party another three minutes. >> this is on the original permit. >> i have a photo of the deck in question. thank you for a hearing us

again. this was constructed in an deceitful manner while we were on vacation behind a screen. i asked the owner if they were going to construct a debt when they first purchase this, and he assured means they were not. they approached us after the last meeting and told us they wanted to talk about revising the deck. they said they would contact us. they believed they were in compliance with their own laws, but when they felt they were in a dominant position, they refused to talk to us.

not to appeal to your sense of fairness, this bears down on us. the deck is actually bigger than the permit allows. that is why we appealed. we would like the deck gone, but we would like it gone with due process and a non-deceitful manner. all of their actions have been deceitful. we just want fairness. >> what is the difference between what you think would be allowed under the current laws

and what they have built, >> now they have built in excess of 30 feet of what the permit allows. if they could make it so it does not bear down on our private living space, and that is what they alluded to. they felt they were in a dominant position. everything has been deceitful and dishonest. >> are there other departments the have the same vantage point of your patio? >> no. >> would you like to see a picture of my patio? >> i thought part of the discussion last time was that they were going to raise the

height of the fence. they were not going to be able to view the patio. >> yes, and also cutting back the perimeter by about 3 feet so it would not bear down so much. the architect approached us as soon as we love and told us he was contacting of the and we again. -- contacting us that weekend. they never did. >> roxanne you repeal the revision? >> correct. i think this issue is they have always been very deceitful and tried to get away with what they

can. when they feel they are in a less than dominant position, they feel approachable. they do what they can -- what they want. >> thank you but we can hear from the permit holder now. >> good evening, commissioners. i think we are here because of the revision permits and the interest fictional the -- the jurisdiction does not make sense. i spoke to the appellant after the hearing for about 20 minutes last time we were here. i said, let's sit down and talk

about it. please call me. three years -- three days later, i got a call. i left my business card. i find it reprehensible someone would lie and say we did not approach him three times in five days. i think the time to approach this is on the calendar for the revision permits that codifies everything missed on this herman, and it corrects all the things. we also asked about adding a privacy wall. we never got a response. the permit the asked us to finally pay for it. that is what we did. we could not get any response from the appellant. >> why am i under the impression i have seen pictures of other people having a vantage point of

this patio? >> that is correct. there are seven different decks that looked down into the appellant and property. literally every property has decks looking down into thethers looking down into their backyard. harris is -- this one is no different. it was scrutinized several times, and a building inspector who measured its and confirmed it was 20 feet off the property line, so we took it to a much higher level, documented everything, and would love to comply to get them some more privacy in their backyard, but you are correct but the adjoining properties to look

down into the backyard. >> thank you. . >> just to clarify after the last hearing, we notice a discrepancy between the permits of the jurisdiction request subjects and the permit that is on appeal, and there is a discrepancy of the rear yard dimensions given. the rear yard would be required, and that is important, because of the death were to extend, and this roof deck were located above the portion in the required rearguard, it would have to have an open railing, so it is verified it does have a code compliant rear yard. i spoke to the reviewer, and we

were satisfied both are code- complying and the scope of that having been exceeded. i will be available for any questions. >> if we were to grant of jurisdiction, what greater scrutiny would is received? what is in the original permit that is not in the other permanent? >> i am not aware of any differences. the only reason the revision would not be required is if they were to reduce the scope and go back to the size of the originally approved deck. they may still require an improvement to document those changes, and i think another permit is going to be required

no matter what. i do not think there is anything greater gains other than potentially delaying the hearing dates from december. >> to graft jurisdiction on this would be redundant? >> it would appear so. >> you are indicating the size of this deck is code compliant? >> that is correct. >> a permit was succeeded, so as a matter of policy, should we make this easier for the permit holder? >> we do not like to seize those of permit exceeded any way -- do not like to see the scope of a permit exceeded in any way. i believe his is now nine times for the permit and six times its work exceed scope, we would not

looking to the. >> in the same way this might be a redundant given the way there is a jurisdiction curio -- there is a jurisdiction, assuming they could both be heard on the same day. >> yes. >> good evening, commissioners. i would like to correctsomethin. it is to terms -- two times if we issued violation. it is not always a notice of violation, so i would be available for any questions. >> how would you construct a

deck like this and screen it? >> we see a lot of screaming on roof decks, but the only requirement would be a 42-inch guard rail. the screening is not required by the building code. >> i imagined it is to protect neighbors properties. they have suggested it was deceitful on the part of the project sponsor to have put it behind a message screen. >> i would not see it as being deceitful. was it some kind of temporary screen bowman's -- of temporary screen? i would not call it deceitful.

people like screens around roof decks for obvious reasons. >> is there any public comment on this item up? seeing none, commissioners, the matter is submitted. >> commissioners, we have heard our case. git is what we would normally looking for a jurisdiction request, and i would have thought it would be a reasonable compromise. going back to the jurisdiction request, the case still has not been made but there were issues of a non-due process to the appellants with respect to the permanence -- permits.